Retaining WallsView full sizeFull-length wall along the boundary
A wall run the whole length of a fence line to win back a flat strip of garden. Ballard lots are narrow, so the width this recovers is width the garden genuinely did not have.
Drainage · Ballard
Yard Drainage & French Drains in Ballard, Seattle
Ballard is the one neighbourhood on this list where our first answer is often that you may not need a drain. Much of Ballard and neighbouring Crown Hill sits on sandier glacial outwash rather than the dense till that underlies most of Seattle, and lots there frequently drain well enough on their own that a full system would be money wasted. The caveat is that it is not universal and it does not respect street boundaries — pockets of till turn up mid-block, and a property two doors from a garden that drains perfectly can hold water all winter. So we test rather than assume, because the difference between the two answers is thousands of dollars either way.
- Typical range
- $10–$25 per linear foot
- From our base
- 15–25 minutes from Capitol Hill
- Ground here
- Sandier glacial outwash through much of Ballard, which drains noticeably better than the till under most of the city — though it is not universal and does not follow street boundaries.
Paver apron and planted strip across the front of a house on an older residential street
What we get called about
Drainage problems specific to Ballard.
Ballard is small lots and good drainage, which is close to the opposite of the rest of Seattle. The typical job here is not holding a slope or fixing a bog — it is making a compact rectangle behind a hundred-year-old house genuinely usable. That means more paved surface than people expect, a turf or lawn area smaller than instinct suggests, and enough planting depth at the boundary to make the space feel enclosed rather than merely small. The one real constraint is access: the older streets have narrow side returns and no off-street parking, so material handling shapes the schedule.
- A pocket of till in an otherwise well-draining street holding water all winter
- A side return between a house and a fence that is bare mud from October
- A downspout on a small lot discharging into a border with nowhere for it to go
- A basement or crawlspace in an older Ballard house taking water at one corner
Worth knowing in Ballard
Before assuming you need a drain in Ballard, dig a test hole eighteen inches down and fill it with water. If it clears within a few hours you are on outwash and your problem is almost certainly roof water or a low spot rather than the ground itself.
The method
How we build drainage, wherever the job is.
The sequence does not change between neighbourhoods — what changes is the ground it is applied to. Full detail on the drainage service page.
- 01
Find out where the water actually comes from
Roof, surface runoff, a neighbouring property's grade, or groundwater sitting on the till. These need different answers and guessing wastes the whole job.
- 02
Establish where it can discharge to
A drain needs somewhere legal and physical to go — daylight at a lower point, or an approved connection. A drain that terminates in a hole is a soakaway on ground that does not soak.
- 03
Cut the trench to a consistent fall
Continuous fall along the whole run. A trench that dips holds water and silts up, which is the most common reason a retrofit drain stops working.
- 04
Lay pipe, rock and geotextile
Perforated pipe bedded in clean washed rock, wrapped in geotextile so the surrounding soil cannot migrate in and clog the void.
- 05
Reinstate the surface
Turf, planting or hard surface put back so the finished job does not read as a scar across the garden.
What it costs in Ballard
$10–$25 per linear foot
Ballard runs are short and the material bill is modest, so the cost sits mostly in handling. On streets with no off-street parking, rock and pipe come off the kerb by hand and have to be cleared the day they arrive, which is real crew time on a small job. Where the ground turns out to be genuine outwash, the recommendation is frequently a downspout tie-in or a regrade rather than a system — a few hundred dollars instead of a few thousand.
No down payment
You pay after the project is fully completed.
Fixed price, agreed up front
The estimate you sign is the price you pay.
0% interest for up to 6 months
Spread the cost with no interest.
Warranty on hardscaping
Covers hardscape work; vegetation excluded.
Local questions
Drainage in Ballard, answered.
General questions about this service are on the service page. These are the ones that only come up here.
How do I know whether my Ballard lot is on outwash or till?
By testing rather than by neighbourhood reputation, because it genuinely varies block by block. The simple version is a percolation test — dig a hole around eighteen inches deep, fill it with water, and see how long it takes to clear. Outwash drains within hours; till can hold water for a day or more. We do this as part of the assessment because the answer changes the recommendation completely. On genuine outwash a full French drain is usually unnecessary, and telling you that costs us a sale and saves you several thousand dollars.
What causes a wet Ballard side return, and does it need a drain?
Usually roof water and shade rather than ground conditions. A side return is the worst microclimate on a city lot — permanently shadowed by the house and often the neighbour's, taking discharge from at least one downspout, and too narrow to dry out. The fix is frequently not a French drain but a combination of tying the downspout into a proper run, a hard surface laid to a cross-fall so water sheds sideways instead of standing, and a route to somewhere it can go. That is a considerably smaller job than a full system and it deals with the actual cause.
Where can a drain discharge on a small Ballard lot?
That is the constraint here rather than the trench. On a flat neighbourhood with lots of three to five thousand square feet, there is frequently no lower point on your own property to daylight to, so the options narrow to an approved connection or — where the ground genuinely is outwash — dispersal into free-draining soil, which is one of the few places locally that actually works. We establish what is available before designing anything, because on a small flat lot the discharge is the design.
My Ballard house has water in the basement. Is that a yard drainage job?
Sometimes partly, and it is worth being clear about the boundary. Exterior work that intercepts surface and shallow groundwater before it reaches the foundation, regrading so the ground falls away from the building, and downspouts discharging well clear of it will resolve a good share of water entering an older Ballard basement. What it will not fix is water coming through a failed foundation wall or a hydrostatic problem below the drain line — that is a different trade. We will tell you which we think you have rather than selling you a drain that does not address it.
Serving Ballard and surrounding neighbourhoods
15–25 minutes from Capitol Hill.
Ballard Avenue · Sunset Hill · Loyal Heights · Whittier Heights · West Woodland · Adams · Crown Hill edge
98107 · 98117
Recent work
Built in Ballard.
Retaining WallsView full size
WalkwaysView full sizeSlab treads set in river rock
A side return too narrow for a full path. Large slabs floated in washed rock give a route through and let the ground either side carry on taking water.
HardscapingView full sizeBlock walls and paved approach at a building entrance
Segmental block walls terracing the grade at the front of a modern building, with a stone column, handrails to code and a paved approach — commercial hardscaping, where the walls have to take footfall as well as soil.
Artificial TurfView full sizeTurf lawn inside a brick border
Artificial turf pinned into a brick paver border so the edge cannot lift or curl. The grape trellis and the raised planter were part of the same job.
Book a free drainage assessment in Ballard.
We come out, look at the ground, and put a fixed written price together. No deposit, and it does not change once agreed.
Free estimate
Drainage in Ballard — get a price.
Three minutes on the form. We reply during office hours, Monday – Friday, 9:00 AM – 7:00 PM, and we come out and look at the site before quoting anything.
Or call (425) 533-9734
Request received
Thank you — we have your details. We reply during office hours, Monday – Friday, 9:00 AM – 7:00 PM. If it is urgent, call (425) 533-9734.